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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28057254">Rain must fall</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilac_the_wolf/pseuds/Lilac_the_wolf'>Lilac_the_wolf</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman &amp; Terry Pratchett</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Established Relationship, Fluff, Idiots in Love, M/M, Post-Canon, bet</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 15:47:14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,186</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28057254</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilac_the_wolf/pseuds/Lilac_the_wolf</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Aziraphale made a bet with Crowley while drunk, and the demon wants to make sure the angel loses. But who's really manipulating who ?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Rain must fall</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You can't even do that,” the demon challenged him again.</p><p>“Of course I can! But I have no reason to,” protested the angel.</p><p>Crowley and Aziraphale were in the back room of the angel's bookshop. Only one full bottle of wine was on the table between them. Crowley had filled it miraculously countless times in the last hour. They were at the point where their glasses had disappeared by miracle and they took turns drinking from the neck of the bottle itself. And to the point where they were having a debate that they would never have had if they were sober.</p><p>“Billions of humans manage to live without the need for miracles, I am perfectly capable of doing the same!” Affirmed Aziraphale for at least the third time.</p><p>“So do it!” Crowley challenged him again.</p><p>“Fine, I'll live like a human for a week, without using miracles!” Exclaimed Aziraphale with an exasperated gesture.</p><p>The demon smiled mischievously.</p><p>“You will regret it when you are sober.”</p><p>“I am sober! Almost sober.”</p><p>The demon's smile got bigger.</p><p>“Then you must already be regretting it,” he said.</p><p>“Almost,” sighed the angel.</p><p>Crowley laughed and finished the bottle in one go before filling it up again.</p><p>“It should be fun!”</p><p>   By the end of the third day, Crowley was beginning to be disappointed. Indeed, the angel seemed to have perfectly adapted to a way of life devoid of divine intervention. But it was not as complicated as it seemed.</p><p>“It's cheating if you stay in your bookshop reading all the time!” Protested Crowley.</p><p>They were both sitting opposite each other again in the back room of the bookshop.</p><p>“That's what I do almost every day,” Aziraphale replied. “And I'm not reading, seeing that you interrupt me every five minutes with your talking.”</p><p>To his great surprise, the demon fell silent. After about ten minutes of perfect silence, Aziraphale looked up from his book. It was not normal. And Crowley was no longer in front of him.</p><p>“Crowley, no,” sighed the angel.</p><p>He had just noticed the black snake that had wrapped itself around his neck. In one movement from his tail, Crowley sent the book flying across the room.</p><p>“You know, you could have just said, 'Put the book down, I have something to tell you,'” sighed Aziraphale.</p><p>The snake looked at the angel with its yellow eyes.</p><p>“But, I have nossssssing to ssssay to you, I just wanted your attenssssion.”</p><p>“My dear, I love you very much, but you are really... annoying sometimes,” said Aziraphale.</p><p>“It'ss you who'ssss annoying, Assssiraphale,” Crowley hissed. “You don't move.”</p><p>The angel did not answer and decided to ignore the demon. He stood up, the serpent still wrapped around his neck, and went to pick up his book.</p><p>“You could have jusssst picked it up by performing a miracle.”</p><p>Aziraphale ignored him again and sat down before taking up his book again. It took at least an hour before Crowley stopped hissing remarks every thirty seconds. He let himself slide to the ground before regaining human form.</p><p>“You're leaving already?” Aziraphale asked without looking up from his book.</p><p>Crowley didn't know if he was mocking him or if he was serious, but he preferred not to ask.</p><p>“I'll come back tomorrow, and I'll get you out of your bookstore,” Crowley said. “And you'll finally see that you need miracles.”</p><p>“See you tomorrow, my dear,” the angel simply replied, turning the page of his book. </p><p>The demon sighed. Then he went out.</p><p>   The next day, when Crowley woke up, it was already past five o'clock in the evening. He barely hesitated before going out to head for the bookstore. He had barely taken two steps outside, when he was already regretting his choice. Torrents of rain were falling from the sky. Miraculously, the rain didn't fall on him, but he still didn't like the greyish atmosphere it gave to the city. He had hardly taken two more steps when he heard a voice calling him.</p><p>“Crowley?”</p><p>He turned around.</p><p>“ Angel ? What are you doing here ?”</p><p>Aziraphale was two steps behind him, just in front of the entrance to his building. He had not used a miracle, so he was soaked from head to toe and shivering with cold.</p><p>“I... I had gone for a walk, but usually I always teleport to my bookstore. So I don't know the way home and it's raining and...”</p><p>He didn't finish his sentence.</p><p>“You've lost your way,” Crowley concluded. “You should have used a miracle, at least to keep yourself warm.”</p><p>“No!” Protested Aziraphale. “I have every intention of proving to you that I can last a week living like a normal human being!”</p><p>The demon sighed and came to open the door of his building.</p><p>“Come on, you can warm yourself up at my place,” Crowley suggested.</p><p>Aziraphale nodded his head and entered the building.</p><p>   But the lobby of the building was almost as cold as the outside, and Crowley's flat was barely less cold. It must have been barely ten degrees. Yet Aziraphale knew that the demon didn't like the cold. Crowley came to sit on one of the leather armchairs in his living room while the angel stood in the middle of the room, still trembling.</p><p>“Why is it so cold in here ?” Aziraphale complained.</p><p>Crowley had a mischievous smile that did not augur well.</p><p>“I don't need heating, I can maintain the temperature I want around me without the help of a heater. If you're cold, use a miracle, or come near the only source of heat,” he said.</p><p>Aziraphale did not immediately understood what he meant by this. Then the demon tapped his knees with a sarcastic smile.</p><p>“Out of the question!” Exclaimed Aziraphale. “I'd rather stay cold.”</p><p>His resolution held for at least thirty seconds. Then he cast a glance at the demon, which was meant to be bad, before coming to sit, or rather to let himself fall, on the demon's lap. Crowley surrounded him with his arms. Immediately the angel stopped shaking. The demon had indeed made the air around him much more pleasant than the biting cold of the rest of the room. Aziraphale nestled against Crowley and buried his head in the demon's neck with a sigh of satisfaction.</p><p>“In fact, you don't need miracles if I'm here to do them for you,” laughed gently Crowley.</p><p>“Shut up, I'm angry with you,” Aziraphale grunted.</p><p>“It's very believable my angel,” he said while caressing his hair.</p><p>Aziraphale sighed.</p><p>“You know, you could have turned up the temperature of the whole room and then asked me to come over on your lap, I would have done it.”</p><p>“I know you would. But I thought if I forced you, you would have refused and ended up using a miracle. I just wanted to make you lose the challenge.”</p><p>There was a brief silence.</p><p>“Idiot,” muttered Aziraphale.</p><p>They stayed like this for a long time, in silence. It was the angel who broke the silence.</p><p>“There is a major disadvantage in not being able to use a miracle.”</p><p>“And that is ?”</p><p>Aziraphale looked embarrassed.</p><p>“Well... I have to buy my own food, I can't make it appear by miracle and...” began the angel.</p><p>The demon interrupted him with a wave of his hand.</p><p>“And the most recent currency you have is Roman denarii,” he said.</p><p>“And so I haven't eaten anything for four days,” the angel confessed.</p><p>Of course, it was not necessary for an angel or a demon to eat. But they felt hungry, especially if they were used to eating every day.</p><p>“You couldn't sell one of your books to get money?” asked Crowley.</p><p>Aziraphale looked at him as if he had said something really offensive and the demon sighed.</p><p>“You could have invited me to dinner,” replied the angel.</p><p>“Well, I can invite you now,” Crowley suggested.</p><p>“I don't want to move.”</p><p>“Then I'll order Japanese.”</p><p>With Aziraphale's smile, Crowley realised that this was what he wanted.  Anyway, whenever he didn't want to go to the Ritz it was because he dreamed of sushi.</p><p>   Ten minutes later, the delivery man knocked on the door, even though Crowley hadn't even called him and that the nearest Japanese restaurant was more than ten minutes away. Aziraphale preferred not to say anything when their meal teleported to the little table in front of them and he heard the delivery man run away with a scream of horror. He only gave Crowley a disapproving stare. For the form. He finally decided to get off the demon's knees and sit on the couch in front of him. He was pleased to see that the whole room was now at a decent temperature. He began to eat in a hurry. He was halfway through his meal when he noticed that Crowley hadn't touched his own at all and was staring at him with a strange look.</p><p>“Is there a problem, my dear?” asked Aziraphale.</p><p>“No, none, keep eating,” Crowley replied simply.</p><p>The angel raised an eyebrow.</p><p>“You don't eat?” he asked.</p><p>He usually liked Japanese food as much as he did.</p><p>“I'll eat when you're done eating.”</p><p>“Why ?” asked the angel with surprise.</p><p>“You look so happy when you eat that I can't stop looking at you.”</p><p>Aziraphale expected almost all the answers except this one.</p><p>“I don't know if it's cute or just weird,” he said in a bored tone.</p><p>And he began to eat again without paying more attention to the demon who was always watching him. Crowley did not start eating again until he realised that the angel was deliberately eating slowly to annoy him. They ate in silence for a little while.</p><p>“I have three days left to make you lose your challenge,” Crowley finally said.</p><p>“You won't make it,” said Aziraphale.</p><p>“And why not?” asked the demon.</p><p>“Because,” explained the angel with a smile, “if I use a miracle while you're not here, you will never know it, and if I have a problem that requires a miracle when you are there, you will do it for me.”</p><p>Crowley had a little chuckle.</p><p>“Today, it's just because you looked miserable that I helped you. I won't help you anymore.”</p><p>“Of course, of course, my dear,” laughed Aziraphale. “You are incapable of refusing me anything if I ask you with a sad look on my face.”</p><p>Crowley shook his head negatively.</p><p>“If it's for the pleasure of seeing you lose, I won't help you my angel.”</p><p>Aziraphale sighed.</p><p>“Does that mean you're going to let me starve for the next three days?”</p><p>“You're on your own,” Crowley said.</p><p>The angel looked sad.</p><p>“Don't try, I know you're doing it on purpose,” said the demon.</p><p>Nevertheless, he decided not to look at him anymore. After a while he ended up looking at Aziraphale again. He hadn't stopped looking sad.</p><p>“Well..”, Crowley began, “I suppose I'll be able to take you to the Ritz once. Or twice. Or three times.”</p><p>“Do you promise?” Asked Aziraphale, eyes shining with hope.</p><p>“Yes...,” Crowley mumbled.</p><p>The angel then lost his sad look and had a wide grin.</p><p>“You see, you are so easy to manipulate my dear !” he exclaimed.</p><p>“Sometimes I wonder which one of us is the demon,” sighed Crowley.</p><p>“I am as angelic as you are demonic,” Aziraphale said. “And the most demonic things you do are threatening plants and bothering people on their phones.”</p><p>Crowley knew it was true, but he would never admit it, he was far too proud for that.</p><p>“I still managed to do something demonic, getting you to go to three dinners when gluttony is a sin.”</p><p>“If it was such a serious sin, I would have fallen into Hell a long time ago.”</p><p>While saying this last sentence, the angel had eaten his last sushi. He put down his chopsticks and rose.</p><p>“I'm going home,” he said.</p><p>“It's still raining a lot,” Crowley said, pointing to the window through which they could see torrents of water tumbling down from the sky.</p><p>Aziraphale smiled at Crowley with a smile that he wanted innocent.</p><p>“Can't you take me back?” he asked. “It'll make a good excuse for you to drive around with the Bentley.”</p><p>“I guess I'm just going to ignore the fact that it's still manipulation,” sighed the demon while getting up.</p><p>He reached out his hand to the angel who took it without question.</p><p>   Aziraphale was not stupid, and did notice that Crowley took several unnecessary detours to delay the moment when they were going to be separated. So when they arrived in front of the bookshop, the angel invited him to come in for five minutes. And the next morning, Aziraphale was quietly finishing his book in his armchair, the demon in the form of a snake peacefully sleeping around his neck. He said he was staying to check that he wasn't using a miracle. And this had led Aziraphale to wonder whether challenging him was not a form of manipulation too. In any case it was a very good excuse to spend more time with him.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hope you like it and feel free to leave comments :)</p></blockquote></div></div>
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